Method of and system for browsing and displaying items from a collection

ABSTRACT

In accordance with an embodiment, a method of browsing and displaying items from a collection is provided. Information about each of plurality of items in a collection is stored. A plurality of user-entered tags is obtained. Each tag comprises a term associated with one or more of the items in the collection. The tags are stored in machine-readable storage media. An image that is representative of an item is displayed on a display screen along with images that are representative of each of a plurality of associated tags. In response to a user selecting a particular one of the displayed tags, an image representing the selected tag is displayed along with a plurality of images that are representative of items associated with the selected tag. In response to the user selecting a particular one of the displayed items, an image that is representative of the selected item can be displayed along with a plurality of images that are representative of tags associated with the selected item.

This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No.61/370,771, filed Aug. 4, 2010, U.S. Provisional Application No.61/374,518, filed Aug. 17, 2010, and U.S. Provisional Application No.61/375,225, filed Aug. 19, 2010. The entire contents of each of theseprovisional applications are hereby incorporated by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to browsing and displaying items from acollection.

Items in a collection are typically arranged by subject matter oralphabetically. For example, a collection of books in a bookstore may bearranged in groups by subject matter. Then, within each subject-mattergroup, the books may be sorted alphabetically by author. Thisarrangement has a drawback in that it makes browsing the entirecollection of books difficult unless a person already knows what he orshe is looking for.

Websites that offer items for sale often employ computer-implementedsearch facilities that allow a person to perform a search of acollection, such as by using a search term selected by the user. Forexample, the person can search for products having a particular keywordassociated with the product. Or, in the case of music and books, aperson can search for a particular artist, author or genre. However, thedisplay of information tends to be somewhat monotonous, with e-commercewebsites displaying their products in a similar manner.

Therefore, what is a needed is are improved techniques for allowingpersons to browse items in a collection and for the display of the itemsfrom the collection.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides methods of and apparatus for browsing anddisplaying items from a collection. In accordance with an embodiment, amethod of browsing and displaying items from a collection is provided.Information about each of plurality of items in a collection is stored.A plurality of user-entered tags is obtained. Each tag comprises a termassociated with one or more of the items in the collection. The tags arestored in machine-readable storage media. An image that isrepresentative of an item is displayed on a display screen along withimages that are representative of each of a plurality of associatedtags. In response to a user selecting a particular one of the displayedtags, an image representing the selected tag is displayed along with aplurality of images that are representative of items associated with theselected tag. In response to the user selecting a particular one of thedisplayed items, an image that is representative of the selected itemcan be displayed along with a plurality of images that arerepresentative of tags associated with the selected item.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention is described with respect to particular exemplaryembodiments thereof and reference is accordingly made to the drawings inwhich:

FIG. 1 illustrates a system that may be used to browse and display itemsfrom a collection in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention;

FIG. 2 illustrates a display screen for browsing and display of itemsfrom a collection in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention;

FIG. 3 illustrates a second display screen for browsing and display ofitems from a collection in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention;

FIG. 4 illustrates a structure of relationships among items from acollection in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 5 illustrates a third display screen for browsing and display ofitems from a collection in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention; and

FIG. 6 illustrates a fourth display screen for browsing and display ofitems from a collection in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF A PREFERRED EMBODIMENT OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides methods of and apparatus for browsing anddisplay of items from a collection. More particularly, the presentinvention provides new, visually creative and attention-grabbing ways ofbrowsing and display of such items. In a preferred embodiment, the usercan not only browse items by traditional criteria, such as genre andname of the author or artist, but also by using innovative criteria anddisplay techniques that use community and social information to identifyitems that are likely to be of interest, and that are related to eachother, in untraditional ways.

The present invention is particularly suited for e-commerce websitesthat offer a variety of products. Such products can include digitalcontent that can be downloaded and/or viewed via the website. Examplesof such digital content include text, video, images, audio andcombinations thereof. These can be in the form of electronic books (alsoreferred to as e-books), music downloads, video downloads (e.g., moviesand television shows), and multimedia presentations that include bothtext and images, such as digital magazines. Such products can alsoinclude products that are ordered via the website and then physicallytransported to the purchaser. Examples include paperback and hardboundbooks, music CDs and video DVDs.

In an exemplary embodiment, the present invention can be implemented inthe context of an electronic commerce system in which consumers browseand view products and possibly also purchase and/or electronicallydownload the products. FIG. 1 illustrates a system 100 that may be usedto browse and display items from a collection in accordance with anembodiment of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, a server 102 iscommunicatively coupled to a plurality of remote devices 104, 106, and108 via a network 110. The a server 102 includes a processor 112, adatabase 114 and input/output devices 116, which may include a display,a keyboard, a mouse, and a network interface. The network 110 mayinclude, for example, a local area network, an intranet, and/or a widearea network, such as the Internet. The remote devices 104, 106, 108,may be implemented as various computing devices, such a desktop orportable personal computer, a “smart” phone, e-book reader device, a PDAor other device. A user accesses the server 102 by using a remote device104, 106 or 108. For example, the server 102 may host website portalwhich can be accessed by users of the devices 104, 106 or 108. Theremote devices 104, 106, 108 may communicate with the server 102 andwith each other by wireless or wired connections. While a single server102 is shown, it will be understood that the functions of the server 102may be performed by multiple servers or by a distributed server system.

In an embodiment, the products include digital content, such as adocuments, which may include text, video, images, audio and combinationsthereof. For example, a document may include both text and images. Thedocuments can be electronic books (also referred to as e-books). Usersmay access the products by downloading and/or viewing the products, andcan perform other actions described herein, via a website which may behosted by the server 102. The products can include other types ofproducts, such as paperback and hardbound books. In this case, theproducts may be ordered via the website.

In an embodiment, the digital content, such as e-books, and informationabout the digital content, such as a summary of each book and an imagethat is representative of the book, are initially stored at the server102. Users can access the content by downloading individual files, suchas an e-book file, to a remote device 104, 106 or 108 and/or by viewingthe content using a remote device 104, 106 or 108. The users can performother actions described herein, via communication the server 102 and/orwith other remote devices 104, 106 or 108. For example, users can join auser community, e.g., by logging into the website using a user name andpassword.

FIG. 2 illustrates a display screen for browsing and display of itemsfrom a collection in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention. This display arrangement may be generated at the server 102and communicated to a user's device 104, 106 or 108 via the network 110.Thus, this display arrangement of items can be displayed on the user'sdevice 104, 106 or 108 by the user accessing the website portal.

As shown in FIG. 2, a selected group of items from a collection aredisplayed graphically. In this example, the items are books or e-books.The items are displayed graphically by an image of each item thatrepresents the item. In the case of e-books, the images can include bookcovers that typically show at least the book title and possibly also thename of the author and cover artwork. Such a group of items is displayedin response to a user selection. In other embodiments, the imagesdisplayed can be album covers, movie posters, magazine covers and soforth.

The collection of items may be sorted according to one or more sortingcriteria that are selected by the user or according to one or moredefault criteria. For example, the criteria may be one or more of:alphabetical by title, reverse alphabetical by title, by subject,alphabetical by author, reverse alphabetical by author, by date (e.g.,date added to the collection or date of publication), length, relevanceto a particular topic selected by the user, best-sellers, user ratings,editor's picks, genre, and so forth. For using relevance to a particulartopic selected by the user, the user may enter one or more search terms.As an example, if the user searched the collection using the term“Stephen King,” the results could include books by him, other booksbeing about him, books he co-wrote, or books mentioning his name, withthe books written by him likely being considered most relevant.

As another example of sorting criteria, “tags” may be used for sortingthe items. Tags are discussed in more detail herein. Thus, for example,items may be sorted according to the number times different users haveentered or otherwise associated a term or tag with each of the items.

As still another example, the user may select “Community Value” forsorting the items. U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/370,771,filed Aug. 4, 2010, and entitled “System for and Method of DeterminingRelative Value of a Product,” is hereby incorporated by reference anddiscusses such a Community Value that can be assigned to the items. Thecommunity value for an item is essentially a value determined bycombining a value representative of purchasing activity directed towardthe item and a value representative of non-purchasing, social activitythat is directed toward the item.

The user may preferably select two or multiple sorting criteria, inwhich case, the sorting criteria are applied simultaneously. Forexample, the user may select only best-sellers in a particularsubject-matter category.

As a result of the sorting, the items are arranged in a particularorder. A group of the items may then be selected for display accordingto the order. For example, if the items are sorted alphabetically byauthor, a group from the beginning of the alphabet can be selected fordisplay. As another example, if the items are sorted according to userratings, the a number of titles that have the highest average userratings can be selected for display. The group can include apredetermined number of items.

In an embodiment, the group of items that are selected for display aredisplayed in a plurality of different image sizes. As shown in FIG. 2,the book covers, or other image that represents the item, are shown inthree different sizes: small, medium and large. It will be apparent,however, that a different number of sizes can be selected. The size ofthe image for an item can correspond to the rank of the item accordingto sorting criteria. Items that fit the criteria best can be rankedhighest and, thus, have the largest images. As an example, where thesorting criteria includes user ratings, the highest rated items can bedisplayed with larger image sizes, whereas, lower rated items can bedisplayed with smaller image sizes. As another example, where sortingcriteria includes relevance, the most relevant items can be displayedwith larger image sizes. Also, where multiple sorting criteria areemployed, different criteria can be used to select the items for displaythan is used to assign image size. For example, the items can beselected for display alphabetically according to the author's name,while the size assigned to the corresponding image can be according toaverage user ratings.

The placement of the images on the display is preferably performed atleast partially at random. Thus, the particular position on the displayscreen that is occupied by a particular one of the items selected fordisplay can be selected randomly. In an embodiment, items having thehighest rank (and thus the largest images) can be assigned positionsbefore items having lower rank (and thus smaller images). Once an itemis assigned a position, its occupied display area is no longer availablefor later-assigned items. Thus, an item having the highest rank (andlargest image size) may be randomly assigned a position first. Then, anext item having the next highest rank (and also possibly having thelargest image size) may be randomly assigned a position among positionsthat are not already occupied by the first item. Then, once the itemshaving largest image sizes are assigned, items having a next largestimage size may be assigned, filling in unoccupied areas in the display.This process may be continued until all items selected for display havebeen assigned a position in the display or until all positions have beenfilled. Preferably, display of all of the items in the group completelyfills the available display area.

So that the display area can be entirely occupied, an entire availablerectangular display area can be divided into a number of smallerrectangles with the smallest image size corresponding to a singlerectangle. For example, such a display area can be divided into a ten byten grid of 100 smaller rectangles. After all of the large and mediumimage sizes are assigned, all of the remaining unoccupied spaces can beoccupied by the smallest image sizes. Therefore, once all of the itemsto be displayed are assigned positions, there are preferably nounoccupied spaces or rectangles.

In an embodiment, the areas of the small, medium and large image sizeshave the following relationship: 1 to 4 to 9. In other words, thesmallest image size occupies one rectangle; the medium image sizeoccupies four rectangles (i.e. an area that is two rectangles by tworectangles); and the large image size occupies nine rectangles (i.e. anarea that is three rectangles by three rectangles). In this embodiment,the relationship is a series of square numbers (1, 4, 9, 16, 25 . . .n²). It will be apparent, however, that a different number of sizes maybe selected and that a different relationship among the sizes may beselected. It will be apparent that image shapes other than, or inaddition to, rectangles can be utilized, such as circles, ovals,triangles, hexagons, and so forth.

Because there is a random aspect to the display arrangement, differentinstances of displaying the same group of items can result in adifferent arrangement. For example, if the user selects to re-load thedisplay, the same group of items may be selected but displayed in adifferent arrangement.

In an embodiment, the selection of items for display may also have arandom aspect. For example, instead of or in addition to applying auser-selected sorting criteria, a group of items may be randomlyselected for display or at least partly randomly selected for display.The items may be arranged at least partly randomly as described above.The image sizes may also be random or they may reflect a sortingcriteria, such as average user ratings. As an example, a user may selectsorting alphabetically by author. Then, a random group of items can beselected among those whose author's last name begins with the letter “A”and with the highest rated items being displayed with larger images.

Additionally, the user preferably can browse through additional groupsof items. As shown in FIG. 2, this may be accomplished by the user byclicking on “forward” and “back” arrows located beneath a displayedgroup of items. This may select different groups of items for displayaccording to the selected sorting criteria. For example, if items aresorted alphabetically and the first 64 items in the sorted list aredisplayed, then clicking the forward arrow may cause a next group of 64items to be selected starting with the 65^(th) item in the sorted list.

The arrangement of items as displayed on the user's device 104, 106 or108 can show the cover images of books (or other images that representthe items) in a seemingly random way across and down the display pageand with different sized images. The overall appearance is of a mosaicof different sized images. While this view is preferably not completelyrandom, since it can be based on sort criteria, it will appear so andeach time the user loads the page the would get a different ordering ofthe images.

The embodiment described above can be used in connection with portabledevices 104, 106 or 108 having a display screen of limited size. Fordevices 104, 106 or 108 having a larger display screen, such as adesktop computer, a greater number of items can be displayed and with agreater number of sizes. For example, there can be four different imagesizes that can have the following relationship: 1 to 4 to 16 to 64.Thus, the largest image size may occupy an area of eight by eightrectangles, with the other image sizes occupying areas that arefour-by-four, two-by-two and one-by-one. In this embodiment, therelationship is 4^(n) where n is an integer series (1, 2, 3, . . . n),with the following result: 1, 4, 4², 4⁴ . . . 4^(n). It will beapparent, however, that a different number of sizes may be selected andthat a different relationship among the sizes may be selected.

Additionally, rather than placing the items in a rectangular grid, theimages may be placed in circular or spiral fashion starting from a pointnear the center of the screen. FIG. 3 illustrates a second displayscreen for browsing and display of items from a collection in accordancewith an embodiment of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 3,different size images are distributed around the display area.Preferably, there are no gaps between items, however, outer portions ofthe display area are not completely filled. As before, the differentsizes can be assigned to items according to each item's rank accordingto the sorting criteria. Thus, the center point appears as a center ofgravity with results flowing out from it rather than down and across thescreen as in FIG. 2. Also, the user can preferably browse additionalitems, for example, by clicking forward and back buttons on the screen.The number of items displayed can be randomly selected within certainconstraints, such as being within a preselected minimum and maximumnumber.

In accordance with a further embodiment of the present invention, eachof a plurality of items in a collection is associated with one or moreterms or phrases (these terms and phrases are referred to herein as“tags”). The tags can represent categories or provide other informationout the item. For example, the tags for a book or e-book can identifyits author, genre, themes of the book, key words related to its contentor any other information or topics related to the book. Specificexamples of tags may include: “New York Times Bestseller,” “mystery,”“romance,” “J. D. Salinger,” “phonies,” “banned,” “modern,” “fiction,”“nature,” “poignant,” “classic,” “boring,” etc.

In a preferred embodiment, the tags include user-generated tags. Forexample, a user may access the web portal using a device 104, 106, or108, and may select any of the items in a collection. The user can thenenter one or more tags selected by the user. The tags are then stored atthe server 102 in a manner that maintains an association between theitem and each associated tag. For example, a number of tags may bestored for each item. Additionally, where the same tag is entered forthe same item by two more different users, this tag is preferably storedalong with the number of times that different users that entered orotherwise associated the same tag with the item.

Additionally, the same tag may be associated with multiple differentitems. Therefore, the stored information also maintains an associationbetween each tag and the associated items that share that same tag.

The tags may be obtained from sources other than users. For example, anoperator of the web portal may determine the tags assigned to each item.As another example, the tags may be obtained from published literaryreviews of the items (e.g. as keywords contained in the reviews). As yetanother example, the tags for a book may automatically include the nameof the author and possibly other information.

FIG. 4 illustrates a structure for relationships among items from acollection in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.The items shown in FIG. 4 are books, though the items could be anothertype of item. Referring to FIG. 4, a particular book, identified in thefigure as “Book 1,” is associated a number of tags, identified as “Tag1,” “Tag 2,” “Tag 3,” “Tag 4,” and “Tag 5.”

The item and its associated tags may be displayed graphically for theuser. FIG. 5 shows a display screen for browsing and display of itemsfrom a collection using tags in accordance with an embodiment of thepresent invention. Referring to FIG. 5, the selected item is a book, inthis case, J. D. Salinger's “The Catcher in the Rye.” The associatedtags are shown as graphic elements (e.g. bubbles or circles). Theassociations between the item and the tags are shown as lines connectingthe tags to the item. In a preferred embodiment, the graphic elementsthat represent the tags have a characteristic that represents therelevancy of the tag to the item. The relevancy can be represented bythe number of times that different users have associated that tag withthe item. And, as shown in FIG. 5, the characteristic that representsrelevancy is the size of the graphic elements (i.e. the bubbles). Thus,in FIG. 5, a larger bubble represents a greater number of users havingtagged the item with that tag.

As explained above, each item in the collection can have a number oftags associated with it. Additionally, the same tag may be associatedwith multiple different items. The user can browse the collection ofitems by clicking or otherwise selecting a particular tag for thedisplayed item. This action will then cause other items that areassociated with the selected tag to be the displayed. FIG. 6 illustratesanother display screen for browsing and display of items from acollection using tags in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention. Referring to FIG. 6, a particular tag, in this case, “MODERN”is shown along with several items that all share this term MODERN as atag. The user may then click on or otherwise select one of the itemsshown that are associated with this tag. This action will then cause theitem to be displayed along with tags that are associated with theselected item (as in FIG. 5).

In this manner, a user can browse the collection of items by alternatelyclicking items and tags. FIG. 4 illustrates this graphically. Assumingan item is displayed (e.g., Book 1 of FIG. 4), the user can select a tagassociated with the item (e.g. “Chosen Tag” in FIG. 4). This causes thechosen tag to be displayed along with several items that have that sametag (these are “Related Book 1,” “Related Book 2,” “Related Book 3,” andRelated Book 4″ in FIG. 4). The user can then click on one of theseitems (e.g., “Chosen Book” in FIG. 4). This causes the chosen item to bedisplayed along with tags that are associated with that item (“Tag 6,”“Tag 7,” “Tag 8,” “Tag 9,” “Tag 10,” “Tag 11,” and “Tag 12”).

Referring to FIG. 6, in a preferred embodiment, the graphic elementsthat represent the items also have a characteristic that representsrelevancy of the item. For example, the relevancy can be represented bythe number of times that different users have associated that tag withthe item. As shown in FIG. 6, the characteristic is the size of theimage of the book's cover. Thus, in FIG. 6, a larger image represents agreater number of users having tagged the item.

As shown in FIGS. 5 and 6, the images representing items include bookcovers. In other embodiments, the images displayed can be album covers,movie posters, magazine covers and so forth.

When an item is displayed, rather than clicking on an associated tag,the user may select to receive details regarding the item. For example,the user may “right click” on the image of the item. This would thendisplay detailed information about that item and possibly alsoinformation about purchasing the item along with an ability to purchasethe item. Also, in an embodiment, a browsing history may appear, e.g.along the bottom of the display. As shown in FIGS. 5 and 6 a browsinghistory appears along the bottom of the display as a alternating seriesof images representing tags and items. By clicking on one of these, theuser is brought back to a previous point in their browsing history.

In an embodiment, a preselected number of tags are displayed for eachitem (as in FIG. 5). Additionally, a preselected number of items aredisplayed for each tag (as in FIG. 6). For example, the preselectednumber can be twelve in both cases. However, it will be apparent that adifferent number could be displayed.

If the selected item is associated with fewer than twelve tags or if theselected tag is associated with fewer than twelve items, then adifferent number can be displayed. Also, in place of the items or tags,different information can be displayed. For example, a link to anotheruser's profile can be used in place of each tag or item. Preferably,this user profile is randomly-selected from among those users who havethe displayed item in his or her own library or who have tagged an itemwith the displayed tag.

If an item selected for display (as in FIG. 5) has more than thepreselected number of associated tags, then the particular tags that aredisplayed (as in FIG. 5) can be selected from among these associatedtags. Preferably, the selected tags include ones that are highlyrelevant to the item (and thus have large bubbles) as well as ones thatare less relevant to the item (and thus have smaller bubbles). In anembodiment, the tags selected for display can be selected at leastpartially at random.

Similarly, if a tag selected for display (as in FIG. 6) has more thanthe preselected number of associated items, then the particular itemsthat are displayed can be selected from among these associated items.Preferably, the selected items include ones that are highly relevant tothe tag (and thus have large images) as well as ones that are lessrelevant to the tag (and thus have smaller images). In an embodiment,the items selected for display can be selected at least partially atrandom.

This browsing and display process is preferably started by randomselection of an item from the user's own library. The user's library canconsist of items that the user purchased or otherwise selected to beincluded in his or her library. If the user does not have any items in alibrary, then the process is preferably started by random selection of a“friend” of the user and then by randomly selecting an item in thefriend's library. A friend can be another user where the two users haveindicated that they are friends. An initial item or tag may be selectedby other means. For example, a tag may be selected at random so that theprocess is started by display of the randomly selected tag and itemsassociated with it. Or, the user may be prompted to enter a tag or toselect a tag from a list of tags.

Therefore, in accordance with an embodiment, a book is obtained from theuser's library (and if the user has no books in his or her library oneis obtained from a friend) and then “things” (i.e. tags) that arerelated to the book are displayed. These things could be the author, thegenre, common tags for the book or even other users who have includedthe book in their library. This then allows the user to explore thecatalog by clicking through displayed items and tags. For example if thebook was “The DaVinci Code,” related tags might be “Dan Brown,”“thrillers,” “European cities,” “religion,” “art history,” etc. The usermay then click any of these related tags and be taken to a new resultset based on what was chosen. If the user chooses “Dan Brown” then thatwill be displayed as the center tag and the author's other books will bedisplayed as related items. This step can be repeated over and overallowing the user to browse deeper and deeper into the collection. Thesystem ideally will utilize tag data (tags provided by publishers andfrom the user community) to tie together products in new and unexpectedways. For example, a user may be browsing “European travel” and comeacross “The DaVinci Code” because many users have tagged it with“Paris,” “The Louvre,” etc. Because individual users can tag items,social/community data is used to selectively display results the usermay never have achieved on his or her own by performing simple searcheson a book title or author.

Because tags are preferably user-entered, there can be a potentiallyunlimited number of tags. In some cases, the user-entered tags can be ofthe same term, but spelled or otherwise represented differently. Forexample, some users may type “20^(th) Century,” whereas, other users maytype “Twentieth Century.” Different representations of terms mean thesame thing are preferably associated with each other and treatedequivalently.

The description above illustrates operation of embodiments of theinvention and is not meant to limit the scope of the invention. It willbe apparent to one skilled in the relevant art that variations will beencompassed by the spirit and scope of the invention and that theinvention may be practiced in other embodiments. The particular divisionof functionality between the various system components described hereinis merely exemplary. Thus, the methods and operations presented hereinare not inherently related to any particular computer or otherapparatus. Functions performed by a single system component may insteadbe performed by multiple components, and functions performed by multiplecomponents may instead performed by a single component. It will also beapparent that process steps described herein can be embodied insoftware, firmware or hardware. Thus, the present invention or portionsthereof may be implemented by apparatus for performing the operationsherein. This apparatus may be specially constructed or configured, suchas application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) or FieldProgrammable Gate Arrays (FPGAs), as a part of an ASIC, as a part ofFPGA, or it may comprise a general-purpose computer selectivelyactivated or reconfigured by a computer program stored on a computerreadable medium that can be accessed and executed by the computer. Sucha computer program may be stored in a computer readable storage medium,such as, but is not limited to, any type of disk including floppy disks,optical disks, CD-ROMs, magnetic-optical disks, read-only memories(ROMs), random access memories (RAMs), EPROMs, EEPROMs, magnetic oroptical cards, or any type of media suitable for storing electronicinstructions, and or coupled to a computer system bus. Furthermore, themethods described in the specification may be implemented by a singleprocessor or be implemented in architectures employing multipleprocessor designs for increased computing capability. Accordingly, thedisclosure of the present invention is intended to be illustrative, butnot limiting, of the scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method of browsing and displaying media itemsfrom a media collection comprising steps of: storing information abouteach of a plurality of media items in a media collection; obtaining aplurality of tags, the tags being terms or phrases associated with oneor more of the media items in the media collection; storing the tags inmachine-readable storage media; displaying an item image that isrepresentative of a media item on a display screen along with tag imagescomprising the terms or phrases of each of a plurality of tagsassociated with the media item; in response to a user selecting aparticular one of the displayed tag images, displaying the selected tagimage along with a plurality of item images that are representative ofmedia items associated with the selected tag, the item images eachhaving a size that represents a respective relevancy of the media itemto the selected tag; and in response to the user selecting a particularone of the displayed item images after said selecting a particular oneof the displayed tag images, displaying the selected item image alongwith a plurality of tag images comprising terms or phrases of tagsassociated with the selected media item.
 2. The method according toclaim 1, wherein each media item is associated with a plurality of tagsand each tag is associated with one or more of the media items.
 3. Themethod according to claim 1, further comprising obtaining tags fromsources other than users.
 4. The method according to claim 1, whereinthe media items comprise books and electronic books and wherein the itemimages that are representative of the media items comprise images ofbook covers.
 5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the tag imagesof each of the tags have a characteristic that represents relevancy ofthe tag to the media item.
 6. The method according to claim 5, whereinthe characteristic is a size of the tag images.
 7. The method accordingto claim 5, wherein the relevancy of the tag to the media item isdetermined from the number of times that users have associated the tagwith the media item.
 8. The method according to claim 1, wherein therelevancy of the media item to the selected tag is determined from thenumber of times that users have associated the tag with the item.
 9. Themethod according to claim 1, wherein said displaying the item image onthe display screen along with the plurality of tag images associatedwith the displayed item image comprises displaying lines connecting theitem image to each of the associated tag images.
 10. The methodaccording to claim 9, wherein said displaying the selected tag imagealong with the plurality of item images associated with the selected tagcomprises displaying lines connecting the selected tag image to each ofthe associated item images.
 11. The method according to claim 1, whereinsaid displaying the item image that is representative of the media itemon the display screen along with tag images comprises selecting a subsetof tags from a group of tags that are associated with the item.
 12. Themethod according to claim 11, wherein the tags in the subset areselected according to relevancy to the item.
 13. The method according toclaim 11, wherein the tags in the subset are selected at least partiallyat random.
 14. The method according to claim 1, wherein said displayingthe selected tag image with the plurality of item images associated withthe selected tag comprises selecting a subset of media items from agroup of media items that are associated with the selected tag.
 15. Themethod according to claim 14, wherein the media items in the subset areselected according to relevancy to the selected tag.
 16. The methodaccording to claim 14, wherein the media items in the subset areselected at least partially at random.
 17. The method according to claim1, wherein the tags comprise user-entered terms.
 18. The methodaccording to claim 1, wherein said displaying the item image on thedisplay screen along with the plurality of tag images associated withthe displayed item image comprises displaying the item image in acentral area of a display area of the display screen and displaying theassociated tag images around the central area.
 19. The method accordingto claim 18, wherein after said selecting a particular one of thedisplayed tag images, the selected tag image is displayed in the centralarea and the item images associated with the selected tag are displayedaround the central area.
 20. The method according to claim 19, whereinsaid displaying the item image on the display screen along with theplurality of tag images associated with the displayed item imagecomprises displaying lines connecting the item image to each of theassociated tag images and wherein displaying the selected tag imagealong with the plurality of item images associated with the selected tagcomprises displaying lines connecting the selected tag image to each ofthe associated item images.
 21. A system for browsing and displayingmedia items from a media collection comprising: a plurality of remotedevices under control of users; and one or more servers in communicationwith the plurality of remote devices wherein the one or more serversstore information about each of plurality of media items in a mediacollection and wherein the one or more servers store a plurality oftags, the tags being terms or phrases associated with one or more of themedia items in the media collection, and wherein the one or more serverscause an item image that is representative of a media item to bedisplayed on a display screen of a particular one of the remote devicesalong with tag images comprising the terms or phrases of each of aplurality tags associated with the media item, wherein in response to auser selecting a particular one of the displayed tag images, the one ormore servers cause the selected tag image to be displayed on the displayscreen along with a plurality of item images that are representative ofmedia items associated with the selected tag, the item images eachhaving a size that represents a respective relevancy of the media itemto the selected tag, and, wherein in response to the user selecting aparticular one of the displayed item images after said selecting aparticular one of the displayed tag images, displaying the selected itemalong with a plurality of tag images comprising terms or phrases of tagsassociated with the selected media item.
 22. Non-transitorycomputer-readable media having stored thereon a software program, whichwhen executed, causes one or more computers to perform a method ofbrowsing and displaying media items from a media collection comprisingsteps of: storing information about each of a plurality of media itemsin a media collection; obtaining a plurality of tags, the tags beingterms or phrases associated with one or more of the media items in themedia collection; storing the tags in machine-readable storage media;displaying a an item image that is representative of a media item on adisplay screen along with tag images comprising the terms or phrases ofeach of a plurality of tags associated with the media item; in responseto a user selecting a particular one of the displayed tag images,displaying the selected tag image along with a plurality of item imagesthat are representative of media items associated with the selected tag,the item images each having a size that represents a respectiverelevancy of the media item to the selected tag; and in response to theuser selecting a particular one of the displayed item images after saidselecting a particular one of the displayed tag images, displaying theselected item image along with a plurality of tag images comprisingterms or phrases of tags associated with the selected media item.